Soviet air raids on Berlin Dates

[researcher111]

I am searching VVS raid dates over Berlin during 1942 and 1943 . In summer of 1941 the VVS complete 3 air raids over Berlin with YER-2 ,IL-4 and TB-6 aircrafts. However not much is known about 420 and 421 DBAP raids in 1942 and 1943 performed with IL-4. Would appreciate details.

[Mirek Wawrzynski]

There were in VIII-IX 1941 in total 10 raids Soviets raids against Berlin, a few were in fact succesful (the city was bombed).

Nine of them were done by VVS RKKA And VVS VMF from Estonian island Sarema done by DB-3F, DB-3 and DB-3T.

And one more mission, was done from near Leningrad airfield by Yer-2 and TB-7.

Attack on Berlin was not possible to be executive by Ił-4 in 1942-43, but was possible by TB-7/Pe-8. This last plane had done of course such attack, a few planes did it.

regards,
mw

PS
the 420. and 421. DBAP did not have such plane like DB-3F but TB-7, if right remember.

[researcher111]

Thanks for your post, though I knew all this about VVS & VMF their departure points and sofort , this was not exactly my question, in addition in 1942 and 1943 there were one or more raids over Berlin by VVS which was part of my question

PS : 421 DBAP used several ER-2 , B-25 and began to re-eqip with IL-4 after Aug 43
420 DBAP used ER-2 aircrafts before being integrated into 421 DBAP after 1941

[HGabor]

Some Berlin missions : 890, 746 AP DD (25 GvAP DD) Pe-8s bombed Berlin on August 11, 17, 30, 1942 and March 13, 1943.

890 AP DD Pe-8, S/N: 42018, piloted by Kubishko was lost on August 30, 1942.
890 AP DD Pe-8, S/N: 42087 crashlanded on March 13, 1943. I hope this helps.

Gabor

[researcher111]

Gabor

Thanks for the update, that's what I was looking for . In addition it seems that :

420 DBAP was also involved in bombing Warsaw, Bucharest and Budapest sometime
in 1942. Do you have any details on that because I don't. There are some rumours
that in 1942 Bucharest was raided by several PE-8's on a long range flight from
deep in the Soviet territory (presumably 890 DBAP or 746 OAPDD from Kratovo/Moscow Obl. )
can you confirm that ?

Incidently 746 OAPDD which was renamed later 25 гап дд began training their crews since June 44
on Lend / Lease or repaired or ex Poltawa Shuttle Bombing ex AAC B-24D's and even flew one
and last mission on these Libs on July 1944 ( target unknown )

Летали интенсивно: февраль 1942 г. - 20 летных дней, 288 самолето-вылетов; март — 21 летный день, 253 самолето-вылета; апрель — 18 летных дней, 268 самолето-вылетов. Советские войска, активно действовавшие на Западном фронте, получали хорошую поддержку непрерывными ударами с воздуха по войсковым и оперативным тылам противника. А потом начались полеты по более дальним маршрутам, порой с аэродромов подскока, расположенных вблизи линии фронта. Многие цели находились под Варшавой, Бухарестом, Будапештом, на территории Германии.

[HGabor]

Budapest was bombed on September 4/5, 1942 by several VVS DD units, eg. 746 AP DD Pe-8s (eg. S/N: 42028, 42057), 3 GvAP DD IL-4s (DB-3Fs), etc.

Next raid was on September 9/10, 1942, again, with several VVS DD units involved. 749, 751, 752 AP DD IL-4s (DB-3F), 746 AP DD Pe-8s, etc. Many IL-4s were lost, eg. 751 AP DD, S/N: 8610, etc.

Sorry, never researched Bucharest raids.
Gabor

[researcher111]

Thanks Gabor very useful stuff , and it will need sometime to understand how they operated , interesting to know what targets were selected by VVS on 4/5 Sept and 9/10 Sept 1942 for the Budapest missions and what scores they achieved.

[HGabor]

Scores?????? ;-))))) They were happy to find the City itself, as they literally hit anything. IF they had specified targets, then they probably hit none of them. Bombs randomly fell eg. on the villa of a popular actress, a brand new, Roman Catholic church, a covered canal, where military and/or industrial targets were not even on the horizon. These were purely residential areas. This means that early soviet navigation was a pure catastrophe, or their mission was only psychological against the civilian population, which is called something else... (But this is really off topic.)

[researcher111]

Gabor

I agree and disagree with you, first of these were long range flights mainly from
Moscow Oblyasty rather of a distance for Soviets to raid Budapest , Bucharest and Warsaw
given the Luftwaffe's & enemy fighters deployment enroute , in addition you forget
that in 1942 most of the Soviets were still with their pants down as into organisation and
the absorbed shock of the invasion added the devastating Stalinist repressions against
own Armed Forces staff, personnel and Aviation Industry .

Also unlike Americans and Brits they were not experienced,properly equipped nor
developed any proper long range air doctrines post the Spanish and Mongolian conflicts.

Therefore, I agree that in 1942 their long range fleet was not efficient rather
more of a propagandistic tool and a daily candy for Stalin. As an example,a pilot (major )
who along his crew had to bail at night out over Budapest in order to discover that in fact
they were in Belarus .Generally speaking and something I agree with , their long range missions were
nothing but a catastrophy

[HGabor]

What you say is just a longer explanation, but not contradiction to what I said. I still don't see what you disagree with...